


A Lonely Spirit Guide

by NiniAtTheYAC



Category: Anne with an E (TV)
Genre: Arguing, F/M, I jsut want Winnie to be better understood, Pain, Understanding, this has been in my head all week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-03
Updated: 2019-11-03
Packaged: 2021-02-01 00:54:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21302387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NiniAtTheYAC/pseuds/NiniAtTheYAC
Summary: Winnifred and Gilbert get into a fight over Anne, but not for the reason you'd think.My very rushed word vomit of how I've been hoping all week that 3x07 will go. Sorry for any mistakes -- I'll probably come back after tonight's episode and clean this up but I wanted to publish before the episode premiered. This might end up being a series.Title inspired by 'A Dream' by Edgar Allen Poe
Relationships: Gilbert Blythe & Anne Shirley, Gilbert Blythe/Winifred Rose
Comments: 2
Kudos: 72





	A Lonely Spirit Guide

**Author's Note:**

> Apparently, I have just taken it upon myself to be Winnie's voice through my fics. It's not even that I'm obsessed with her as a character or love interest. I'm just obsessed with her being a fully realized character.

“Ugh.” -- SLAM -- 

Winnifred jumped at Gilbert’s rude and unexplained outburst once more. Since he had arrived that day he had been the most unpleasant version of himself that she had witnessed yet. Storming around the office, shutting cupboard doors with unnecessary force, sighing and grunting while moving from task to task. Looking up from her desk she saw him pacing at the window of the office front, with a terribly sour expression on his face. 

Up until now, Winnifred relied upon the proper manners that her parents had instilled upon her to maintain her calm, but this final outburst was her last straw. “Mr.Blythe, would you please cease your theatrical display of anger and instead share what it is that has made you so cross?”

At the sharp tone in her voice, Gilbert froze and turned to her looking like a frightened animal. “No?” Winnie filled in for him, “Is it something I’ve done then?” This question seemed to reanimate him. 

“No!” he said, swiftly crossing the room to her. “No, it’s just- it’s… nothing.” Winnifred scoffed at his ridiculous response. ‘How dumb must he think I am?’ she asked herself. 

“Well if this is how you behave when nothing is wrong and no one’s upset you, then perhaps that’s good to know,” she said with a level gaze. His eyes clouded with anger and resentment. “Gilbert, I don’t associate with people who cannot express their frustrations with civility, so if you could please speak your mind I would be ever so grateful.” 

“It’s just,” Gilbert paused. Turned away, turned back, looked her in the eyes and sighed before finishing his statement. “It’s Anne.”

Winnifred was certainly not expecting that to be the reason for his temper. For one thing, his reaction to Anne at the fair almost had Winnie believing that he was in love with the young woman. For another, Anne’s face whenever she looked at Gilbert had left Winnie -certain- that Anne was in love with Gilbert. “The girl that I met at the fair?” Gilbert nodded. “The poor thing with the liniment cake?” Gilbert nodded once more. “Well, she seemed like a lovely girl, what about her has put you in such a state?”

Gilbert sighed, “It’s just that she can be… so…” It was painfully clear to Winnifred that Gilbert struggled to define the girl in more ways than one. “She can just be -impossible- sometimes!” 

Not wanting to say too much, Winnie simply asked; “Impossible, how?”

“Today, when we were at our school paper meeting - a paper which only exists because of her insistence - I might add. All Anne could do was hold congress with the other girls and gossip about the events with Josie and Billy during the fair! So, I went to them and kindly suggested that they return to their work.” Gilbert paused shaking his head in frustration. 

“And?” Winnifred prompted, not one for suspense. 

“And Anne completely lost her temper with me! Started shouting about how the subjects of our paper didn’t matter as much as their gossip, and something about it being an issue which concerned ‘an entire gender’,” the last part Gilbert related with air-quotes rolling eyes. “And to round it all off, she insinuated that the only reason I was asking them to focus was because I had a corrupt moral agenda to attend to.”

“Well, did you?” Winnifred asked with as calm a tone as she could muster.

“I suppose I did want them to focus that we could get our work done and I would be free to come see you.” He admitted with a bit of resignation. Winnie nodded, thinking. “But is that really so wrong.”

“Well,” she said cooly. “It is when rushing through your publication means that you’d ignore a plea for a woman’s reputation which has been wrongly stained.” Gilbert looked up meeting her eyes with a shocked and confused expression. Winnifred was exasperated with his ignorant ways. “Anne is entirely right, Josie is not the first woman to be wrongly shamed by her society, and she certainly won’t be the last.” 

“Winnie, I mean no offense, but you can’t be certain that what Anne says about Billy is even true. You don’t know Josie, and you don’t know Anne as well as you think you do. You don’t know her like I do.” Gilbert looked like a bleeding heart when he spoke but he sounded just like every other condescending man that she’d ever met. 

“Mr.Blythe, I don’t have to know Anne or Josie to believe them. Based on the scene that Anne showed no fear in creating before the whole town, I find it hard to believe that she’d be the girl to sit around hiding behind gossip when she could speak openly. And I don’t have to know either of the girls to know them better than you.” Winnifred felt her face warm, her blood running hotly through her veins. 

“What is that supposed to mean?” Gilbert asked incredulously.

‘Oh please. Maybe I’m doing the poor Anne-girl a favor by occupying this ridiculous boy’s attention for her’ Winnifred thought to herself before she answered him. “It means that women are full of complicated and raw thoughts and emotions that men never even think to give them credit for possessing. And I’d venture to guess that most women would agree that when good people see wrong in the world and fail to act against it, they become a part of the problem.”

“Well, that’s never been Anne’s problem. She never seems to know when to stop.” Gilbert said this mostly to himself, not liking that Winnifred would take Anne’s side in this. 

“Do you mean to imply, Mr.Blythe, that there is a time at which a woman should choose to silence herself?” Winnifred couldn’t even yell at him she was angry, yes, but more so she was terribly disappointed in him. “That when it becomes an issue for the comfort of others we should know when it’s best to simply hold our tongues and be a pretty little piece rather than a person?” Her eyes stung with unshed tears. 

Gilbert’s face lit up with understanding at her words and the audible pain in her voice. Winnifred could see him realizing the implications of his words and actions. “I- no!” He nearly gasped in his response, “I have never, I would never mean to imply such an awful thing! I never set out to silence the voice of any woman!”

“Well, I should truly hope so, Gilbert, but as the saying goes, ‘actions speak louder than words’, so perhaps you should set yourself upon finding a way to prove your worth through your solidarity in fighting this matter.” Gilbert nodded slowly, his eyes were filled with storm clouds of contemplation. He suddenly turned from her, fetching his coat, before heading towards the door. He reached for the handle, but in an afterthought, turned back to Winnifred. “I think I know what I have to do to make things right. Thank you, Winnie.” 

‘You’ll not “make things right” Gilbert, you’ll “make things right -with Anne-’ Winnifred thought to herself. She could see that this may be the first time she’d knowingly watched him leave her from Anne, but it would certainly not be the last. Winnie’s eyes stung, her throat swelled, she choked out a small sob as a few stray tears fell from her eyes. Feeling foolish for crying over this boy of a man who she should never have allowed close to her heart. He didn’t even seem to know how to care for his own heart.


End file.
